Episode Information

Airdate

Written by

Directed by

Surgeons don't compromise. We defy death, we exceed perfection. We operate for seventeen hours straight if we have to. We aren't built to settle, but that doesn't mean we won't. When we follow our hearts, when we choose not to settle, it's funny. Isn't it? A weight lifts, the sun shines a little brighter, and for a brief moment, we find a little peace.

Contents

The survivors from the crash are asked to make an almost impossible decision that will affect the rest of their lives. Meanwhile, tension grows between Jackson and April after they're forced to work together, and Alex tries to restrain himself with one of the interns.

Meredith, Derek, Callie, and Owen are gathered in a conference room with their representative and a representative from the airline. Their representative lists all the injuries from the plane crash, and Lexie and Mark's deaths. Meredith and Derek ask about the investigation. The airline rep says that could take years, but the one-time settlement they're offering can help them to put it all behind them now. The decision must be unanimous and accepting it means releasing Bayview Aeronautics from all claims. He gives Derek a paper with the amount of money. Derek passes it along.

Cristina's in her bed in Minnesota. She's on the phone with Owen, who's just told her the amount of money. It's a lot. Owen says they need an answer in three days. They tell each other they've been fine. He asks her to call him when she's decided. She says she will.

Derek and Meredith are in bed, wondering if they should settle. They decide to go to sleep. Meredith wants the lights to remain on.

Arizona's in a wheelchair in front of the TV while Callie is talking about the money and what it could mean for their future. They could be taken care of. She thinks Mark would want that. She wants to know what Arizona wants. Arizona ignores her completely. Callie says the home health care nurse will be by soon, and asks Arizona not to throw things at this one.

Meredith enters the attendings' lounge and asks Alex why an intern complimented her on the crown moldings in her house. Alex sleeps there because chicks like it better than on-call rooms. Meredith wants her key back. April comes in and explains Owen offered her her job back. Bailey is surprised. Jackson comes in to change his scrub top. He's surprised to see April, who's surprised he's not in Tulane. Bailey doesn't want Jackson to change in front of everyone. Alex and Meredith leave, leaving their dishes behind. April's glad to be back. Bailey looks around at the mess they've made as Richard comes in. She says she can't get used to having them in the attendings' lounge. He's still getting used to having her in here.

Cristina meets with her boss and tells him she visited the Mall of America. He knows she just googled it, but she promises she'll be a team player. He tells her she'll be working with Dr. Thomas for now.

Alex and Jo arrive in the ER, where Callie and Shane are getting ready for an incoming patient, a 16-year-old girl who had a sailing accident.

They head out to the ambulance bay and Alex introduces himself to Jo. She introduces herself, too, and he says he likes chicks with boys' names. Callie tells him to stop sleeping with his co-workers as it ruins them. The ambulance arrives.

Stephanie presents the case of Roxie Meyers, who came in for excess skin removal after a 117-pound weight loss. Her fiancé Frank is proud of her. April comes in as the consult. She's going to repair Roxie's hernia. Jackson needs to go over the incision points. Roxie asks Frank to go since she'll have to disrobe. Once Frank's gone, Roxie says they've been together for 2 years and they haven't had sex. She wants to feel pretty. April says she already is. Roxie asks when she can jump Frank. Jackson says her incisions will be healed after two weeks, so that's the moment. Roxie gets butterflies.

Emery, the girl from sailing accident, explains how a storm caused the mast to break, which crushed her leg. Then Pickle just rolled over. Pickle's her boat. Emery was doing a solo sail. The inters remove the splint from her leg, revealing an open fracture. Callie tells Emergy they might not be able to save her foot since there's no blood flow. Emery panics and Jo notices her toes are moving.

While they're transporting Emery, Jo says the tibial nerve is still intact, so Callie might be able to save the foot. Shane says Emery's parents will arrive tonight. Callie tells Shane he can scrub in. Jo wants to scrub in, too, but Alex needs her to monitor his pre- and post-ops.

While Cristina is checking up on her patient, his family arrives with a tater tot hot dish. Cristina says he can't have that as Pop Pop has an enlarged heart. Dr. Thomas beckons Cristina.

Outside the room, he advises to never go into Mr. Patel's room during visiting hours. She asks if he's still planning on doing the ventricular reduction surgery. Thomas is. Cristina asks if an L-VAD wouldn't be in order. Thomas says that is a band-aid. Cristina says his surgery is risky, while an L-VAD is an easy fix.

Meredith and Derek are cleaning up their living room. They talk about settling. They could travel the world with the money, and the investigation won't bring Mark or Lexie back. They then realize Zola is asleep and all they're doing is talking.

April meets with Jackson. She wants to go over the incisions. He shows her the incisions on a simulation. She says it looks good. He notices she'll be staying at the hospital. He wants to say why he didn't call her, but she cuts him off and says she's revirginizing, since she got to pray a lot in Moline. It's her second chance now that she has God's forgiveness. Jackson says it's just her way to pretend they never happened. April says it's not that, but Jackson leaves. Bailey, who's been sitting in a chair without them noticing, makes a face.

Cristina approaches Dr. Parker and he asks her how she's doing. She says fine. He reads her face and says that it tells him otherwise. She says she came here to do innovative, cutting-edge surgeries with him, not Thomas. Parker says everybody has to take a shift to babysit the old man, but he'll see to it that she can join him soon. He has a good surgery coming up. She's excited. He wants to see her smile, for real. She gives it her best shot. He compliments her smile.

Bailey is complaining to Richard about April, who was fired twice. She hasn't been in an OR in months and now she's doing an umbilical hernia. Her head is not in the game. Bailey will get her a babysitter.

Meredith's FaceTiming with Cristina again. Bailey's putting up Post-its all over the lounge. Jackson and April greet Cristina. Jackson puts his bag on the table. Bailey writes him a note, saying this is not his closet. As he takes it off, he bumps into April, causing her to spill her coffee all over herself. Jackson suggests they just pretend this never happened. Alex is sleeping on the couch. Bailey wakes him up with a note saying this is not his bed. She then gives Meredith a note that tells her to scrub in with April, who objects. Meredith asks Cristina if she's thought about the settlement. Cristina is fine with whatever everyone else wants to do.

Callie tells Emery's parents that their daughter is tough. Emery shows them a picture of a boat that someone's willing to donate because of the accident. Emery says she can still make it before the bad weather hits if she can leave here within the next two weeks. Callie suggests she can amputate her foot so she can leave within the week. Getting her back to full function, or really close to it, means a whole series of big surgeries over a few months, which means staying off the foot completely. Emery wants full function, but Callie needs the parents' consent. The dad signs after Emery asks him too.

Callie leaves the room and Jo gives her some coffee. Jo compliments her looks and asks if she wants to grab a drink later, stumbling over her words. Callie knows she's flirting to get something, because she can tell that despite her words, the look on Jo's face says that she's terrified that Callie might say yes. She's poking a very horny bear. And what would she do if the bear said yes? She'd end up trading sexual favors for ...? Callie wonders what Jo wants. Jo wants to scrub in on the surgery. Callie says trading sex for scrubbing in makes her skanky. Save it for getting to cut. Also, she's giving coffee to the wrong person. Alex walks by and Callie says Jo got him coffee. He takes it. Jo asks if she can scrub in, but he says no.

Jackson, April, and Meredith are operating. Jackson says they can pretend the patient never had a hernia. April says she's not trying pretend it never happened, she's just wiping the slate clean. Meredith doesn't know what they're talking about, and prompts them to inform her, to which they both end up saying it's nothing. She stares at the two back and forth, slowly coming to the realization of what happened between them.

While doing some physical therapy for his hand, Derek is lost in his thoughts.

Derek finds Richard and asks if he remembers the Donna Drake case. Richard won't ever forget it, because the hospital ended up settling for a lot of money. They caused her death. The bigger the mistake, the bigger the settlement. Richard asks if they're offering them a big settlement. Derek says yes.

While he's stitching up a lac, Owen's on the phone with Cristina. She tells him he can see what everyone else wants and she'll agree to that. Cristina tells him about the woman who does the code calls at her hospital and has the most nasal voice ever. They wait for one.

Jackson, April, and Meredith scrub out. April leaves and Meredith hits Jackson on the head with a towel. He defiled a virgin. Jackson says April's a grown woman. He didn't manipulate her. She gave him her virginity. They did it together and she can't handle that, so she's praying. He's pissed and it's a mess. Meredith says she missed a lot with that plane crash. Jackson says the Chief banged his mother. He clarifies he's talking about Richard. Meredith is surprised and says he banged her mother, too.

Callie, Alex, and Shane are operating while Jo's up in the gallery. Callie suggests Alex let her come down for a while, but Alex sends her to check on a patient again. The new peds attending is stupid, so he'll need his interns to work until Arizona comes back.

Callie meets with Meredith, Derek, and Owen and tells them the money can help Arizona and Sofia. She wants to settle. You can't walk away from a number like this. Owen says Cristina would want to take it, too. Meredith says yes, too. Derek wants to hold off until tomorrow.

In surgery, Thomas tells Cristina he googled her. He knows about the plane crash. Cristina wants to talk about medicine. He talks about his technique, which surprised her. He's devoted his life to develop it. He doesn't have a family to go home to and he doesn't chit chat. He asks what her signature move is. She better get one. He continues to teach her.

Arizona and Callie are having dinner. Callie says the settlement meeting is at 8 tomorrow and asks Arizona if she's going. Arizona says Callie's going, so she doesn't have to. Callie says she's going to speak for Mark. Arizona should come to speak for herself as Callie can't decide for her. Arizona says she wasn't shy about making other decisions for her, like hacking off a limb. Callie gets angry and says she'll make the decision then. She'll vote to take the settlement for Sofia, as Mark would want her to have the money. Their fight has woken up Sofia, who's crying. Callie goes to pick her up.

Derek's sitting out on the deck of his house.

Meredith and Cristina are on the phone with each other. Meredith tells her that April and Jackson slept together, but April's revirginizing. Cristina says April won't be able to think straight when she hears Jackson's voice.

April and Jackson show Roxie the result. She's delighted at the result. Frank comes in and averts his eyes. She puts his hand on her belly. Jackson and April share a look. April quickly leaves.

Jo tells Alex she's doing all his work. He asks if she's scheduled his consult. She hasn't had the chance. He tells her to stop charting and do it now. Jo starts crying. She told herself she wouldn't do that. Jo says she's not a person who fails. She's become the loser intern after blowing the intern appy and he's piling her with scut so she's clearly pissed him off, too. Alex says interns get scut, it's the best way to learn. She hasn't pissed him off. Callie told him not to flirt with her because he may have dated a couple of other interns. Jo says she has no interest in him since he's screwed every one of her friends. Alex allows her to scrub in tomorrow.

Callie tells Hazel, Emery's mother, that Emery's promised to take it easy. Hazel says she was lying, since she's planning to go back out there with her new boat as soon as Callie lets her leave. Callie says she'll loose the foot if she does that. Hazel suggests Callie can keep her here to recuperate. Callie can't do that without medical necessity. Hazel says Emery will hate them if they stop her from sailing. Callie says to let her. She can't be scared of her own daughter, who's still a little girl. Parents have to be the bad guy sometimes.

Derek's at a hangar that holds the wreckage of their crashed plane. While Ray, who's part of the investigative team, talks about the parts of the plane, Derek looks around and has flashbacks. Derek asks what happens with all this if they decide to settle. Ray shrugs.

Jackson finds April, who apologizes for running off. Jackson says he can't pretend it didn't happen. April says she can't stop thinking about it. He knows. He asks if she wants to get married. If she's serious about the revirginizing thing, that means the next guy she'll have sex with will be her husband. He's not ready to be a husband, and he thinks she's not ready to be a wife. They should remember it happened so it doesn't happen again, unless they want it to. April says she can't be near him. He agrees it's better to stay away from each other for a while. They end up kissing.

Bailey is cleaning the microwave while complaining about the new attendings. Richard asks her what's going on. Bailey says Tuck let go of her hand. It was his first day of kindergarten and she was prepared for tears, but he just let go and walked in without looking back. She called Tuck's father, who's busy because he's getting married again. She called Ben, who was about to observe his first laprascopic surgery. Everybody around her is conquering new things and she's stuck. She didn't care and didn't notice, until Tuck let go of her hand. Richard says that when someone lets go of your hand, you get it back. Everyone's still there and they still love her, but it means she has time to do something, to take things to the next level. She has to get out there and do something, without looking back.

Owen's on the phone with Cristina. They're meeting about the settlement in an hour, so he needs to know what she wants. She doesn't care, whatever the group wants is fine with her. Owen says he'll call her, but Cristina says she'll get the lawyers to call. They can't keep doing this. She's here now. He knows. They say bye and hang up.

Callie comes home to get Arizona to go to the meeting, but she finds Arizona sitting on the floor in the bathroom, in a pool of urine. Arizona fired the nurse because she didn't like her. She thought she could get to the toilet in time by herself, but apparently she was wrong. Callie asks if she fell and if she's okay. Arizona points out her situation and says she's obviously not okay. Callie decides to put Arizona in the shower. Arizona heavily resists as Callie picks her up and screams that Callie did this to her. Callie says that is a problem because she and the bathroom now stink. She won't share her home with someone who smells like this. They get under the shower. Callie breaks down and says this is her life now, too.

Thomas joins Cristina on a bench outside the hospital. He tells her he was in a plane crash once in Vietnam. Everyone on board died but him. He never told that to anybody around here. He offers her a cigarette, but she declines. He doesn't smoke anymore, either. It seems like everything can kill you today. She's not sure how to respond and laughs.

Derek arrives late in the conference room. Everyone's agreed to take the settlement. Derek stops them. He says he want to a hangar and saw the pieces of their plane. If they settle, they won't be able to do anything with the results of the investigation. The airline rep says the company will act accordingly. Derek says big companies are always very good about self-policing. Callie says accidents happen. They make mistakes too. Derek says they do, but they make sure it never happens again, so future patients never have to go through it. They can't stand by and let this happen to other people's Lexies and Marks. They have to make this right. The doctors' rep reminds them the decision has to be unanimous. Callie tells the rep she's not one of them, so she has no idea what they're going through. She starts crying and says Derek is right. She looks at the rep and says they can't take the money. The other doctors agree.

Emery, 16, was fished out the sound after a sailing accident which happened while she was trying to sail solo from Mexico to Alaska. Her leg was crushed under the mast of her sailboat. They initially couldn't get a pulse in her foot and Callie assessed that it would likely have to be amputated, but when Emery panicked and her foot started moving, they thought they might be able to save it. Callie planned a series of operations over several months, but emphasized that Emery would have to stay off her feet the whole time. After her first surgery, Emery's mother came to Callie concerned that Emery was going to take off sailing again before she was healed and Callie encouraged her mother to "be the bad guy" to protect her daughter.

Roxie, 30, was in the hospital to have excess skin removed following a 117-pound weight loss. She also had a hernia that needed to be repaired. The surgery was successful and Roxie and her fiancé were pleased with the results.

Isaac was in the hospital for ventricular reduction. Cristina suggested an LVAD instead, but Dr. Thomas was insistent. In surgery, Dr. Thomas showed Cristina his signature move, a technique of his own creation. The surgery was successful.

This episode's title originated from the song Love the One You're With, originally sung by Stephen Stills.

This episode scored 9.69 million viewers.

Upon meeting Jo, Alex tells her he digs "chicks with guy names." However, out of the many girls Alex has shown to be with, Jo and Izzie are the only ones with traditionally male/ambiguous names. This is perhaps to foreshadow at the longevity of Alex and Jo's relationship, as if to parallel it to his and Izzie's.

Meredith: Well, if it makes you feel any better: he banged my mom too.

Callie: I'm coming to get you, you're going to this meeting, it starts in twenty minutes! (looking for her) Arizona... Where are you? (she finds her lying on the bathroom floor) Are you okay? Where is the nurse?

Jo: And, uh... just beautiful... eyes. You know, if you want to drab ... grab a drink later or ... Okay. I know this Mexican place...

Callie: Okay, okay, okay, you're flirting with me, which is really sweet or would be really sweet if you were into ladies, but I'm guessing that you're not a lady lover, 'cause you also look terrified that I might say yes. You're poking a bear, a very horny bear. And what would you do if the bear said yes? And there you'd be, trading sexual favors for ... I don't know what it is you want from me, so ... you're gonna have to tell me.

Jo: I was wondering if it would be possible to scrub in on your next surgery.

Callie: Okay, A, never trade sex for scrubbing in because that's just skanky. Save it for actually getting to cut. And B, you're giving coffee to the wrong person.

Derek: We can't do this. I saw the plane. I went to the hangar and I saw the pieces of our plane laid out on the floor like a jigsaw puzzle. If we agree to settle, they do the investigation, and we can't do anything with the results.

Airline Rep: Bayview Aeronautics will take the results and act accordingly.

Derek: Oh, I'm sure you'll be very thorough. Big companies are always very good about self-policing.

Derek: Yes, we do. But when we do, we have M&Ms, we pore over the files, we make sure it never happens again. And we try to make sure future patients never have to go through that grief. They don't have to sleep with the lights on every night because the darkness is too much. We just can't stand by and let this happen to other people's Lexies and Marks. We have to do something about it. We have to make this right.